1. Field of the Invention
The invention is related to the field of digital content protection, and in particular, digital content modification using a key hard coded internally to an end user system to protect digital content.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Content providers and end users alike have become increasingly concerned with the issue of digital content protection and digital rights management. In the prior art, software and hardware based encryption methods have been implemented in end user systems to protect digital content and manage digital rights. Examples of end user systems include, for example, personal computers, mobile computing and communication devices, music and video devices, mobile phones, personal digital assistants, as well as other types of end user systems.
One way in which content providers desire to manage digital content is to limit content to particular devices or end user systems. Problematically, most prior art digital content protection technologies lack the ability to link digital content to particular end user systems. For instance, many prior art cryptographic processes use software based keys to decrypt encrypted content. Due to the ease with which software based keys are distributed, encrypted content can be downloaded and decrypted to any number of devices, regardless of the concerns of a content provider.